Canadians will soon be paying more for their blank CDs. The Copyright Board Of Canada recently issued a decision that will increase the private copying levy on all blank CDs from 21¢ to 29¢ for the years 2008 and 2009.

The Copyright Board of Canada issued today a decision on private copying levies for the years 2008 and 2009. The decision maintains the rate for audiocassettes at 24¢, and increases the rate for all CDs to 29¢. Since 2001, the certified rate for CDs had been 21¢.

“Two main factors led the Board to raise the CD levy rate to 29¢”, said Claude Majeau, Secretary General of the Board. “First, the mechanical royalties that record labels pay to record a song onto a prerecorded CD have increased. Second, because consumers now use compression technology when they record music, the average number of music tracks copied onto a CD went from 15 to more than 18.” 

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OCZ Technology sent out a press release this morning, announcing its new Vertex Series of Solid State Drives (SSDs). Available in capacities up to 250GB, the Vertex Series features OCZ's newest architecture and controller design complete with 64MB of cache, which allows the drives to reach 200MB/sec read and 160MB/sec write speeds.

OCZ Technology Group, Inc., a worldwide leader in innovative, ultra-high performance and high reliability memory and computer components, today unveiled the OCZ Vertex SATA II 2.5” Solid State Drive (SSD) Series, a premium offering for enthusiasts demanding the latest technology in this fast-developing sector of the storage market. The latest high-performance and cost-efficient SSD, OCZ has gained momentum in pioneering flash storage technology while maintaining a price point that is truly within the reach of a wide range of consumers.

“The new Vertex Series of SSD drives are a premium MLC based SSD solution that are designed for consumers that require fast, rugged, and reliable solid state storage,” commented Eugene Chang, Director of Product Management for the OCZ Technology Group. “The Vertex makes use of our newest architecture and controller design complete with 64MB of cache to offer faster transfers and superior overall system response times in a broad range of applications and games.”

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GfK Retail and Technology announced this week that Blu-ray sales have reached record levels in Japan. Their latest sales figures revealed that unit sales of Blu-ray Disc recorders surpassed that of DVD recorders during the first week of November. GfK also reports that Blu-ray Disc recorders are replacing DVD Recorders 1.5 times faster than DVD recorders replaced VHS recorders.

Super Talent sent out a press release today, announcing its new line of UltraDrive solid state drives (SSDs). The MLC-based UltraDrive ME is available in capacities up to 256GB and is capable of 200 MB/sec read and 160 MB/sec write speeds. Designed for enterprise servers and data centers, the SLC-based UltraDrive ME boosts performance even further with 230MB/s read and 170MB/s write speeds.

Super Talent Technology, a leading manufacturer of Flash storage solutions and DRAM memory modules, today announced a new line of UltraDrive solid state drives (SSDs) that are twice as fast as the world’s speediest SATA hard drives and are offered in capacities up to 256GB.

UltraDrive LE SSDs are designed expressly for enterprise servers and data centers where exceptional performance, reliability and endurance are paramount. The UltraDrive LE supports very high transaction speeds (IOPS), and supports sequential read/write speeds of 230/170 MB per second. While outperforming 10,000 RPM hard drives, the UltraDrive LE uses substantially less power and generates less heat. Based on SLC NAND Flash, the UltraDrive LE is offered in 32GB, 64GB and 128GB capacities.

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